


Coagulation

by Lelarin



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Friendship, Gap Filler, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Relationship, Sanctuary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-29
Updated: 2014-01-29
Packaged: 2018-01-10 10:43:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1158726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lelarin/pseuds/Lelarin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Abbie and Crane leave the Fredericks' Manor, before she talks to him over rum the next day in the Armory. </p><p>Abbie sees things in Crane that frighten her. But she's still his Lieutenant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Coagulation

_I’m dead man walking here._

_That’s the least of all my fears._

\--“Barton Hollow” The Civil Wars

 

 

Abbie took him home. When she dropped Lena Gilbert off at the hospital, Abbie looked at Crane hard and considered dragging his ass through the emergency room doors, too. It’s his stillness that stopped her; he rested in her passenger seat like a man carved from marble.

 

He didn’t turn to look at Abbie when she slid back into the car, didn’t even twitch when she peered at him for a few careful minutes. Crane merely sat and breathed steadily, chest rising and falling incrementally, as the blood coagulated on his skin. He was still staring blankly into the glare of the streetlights when Abbie finally shifted the car into gear and pulled away.

 

They said nothing to each other on the drive to Corbin’s—to Crane’s—cabin, and that may be what worried Abbie the most. She had never seen Crane be silent for so long. She hadn't thought it possible, since he always needed to comment on every damn thing. He’d still succeeded in having the last word, though.

 

_I should like to go home now._

 

Abbie hadn’t replied then and didn’t say anything now. So they sat together in stiff silence while the reek of blood choked the air.

 

After she eased them to a stop outside the cabin, Abbie waited for Crane to reanimate himself but he hadn’t even noticed the change of scenery. She got out, trying to control the clench of frustration in her jaw, crossed in front of the SUV and pulled his door open sharply.

 

“Crane.” Her voice was a prod.

 

He moved then. Abbie saw it in his face as Crane came back to reality; confusion briefly twisting his features before he turned to her.

 

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” he finally said and nearly stumbled stepping out onto the gravel drive. When Abbie caught his elbow her palm was made thick and sticky with half-dried blood and she was instantly and startlingly furious with him. She clenched her hand hard on the crook of his elbow and she could feel his bewildered twitch through the tips of her fingers. She kicked the SUV’s door shut behind him.

 

“Come on,” Abbie said as she tugged him to the cabin. Crane followed her obediently, still dazed, which only made her more enraged. He should be protesting her inconsiderate treatment of his noble personage, or something equally pretentious, but he allowed himself to be led like an errant child to his own front door.

 

Abbie had to let go of him to unlock the cabin and push open the door, but Crane followed her in without a fuss. He seemed more himself in the homey surroundings of the cabin, the smoky smell of the banked fire curling around them both. Crane closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, arms held stiffly at his sides. When he opened his eyes again, he finally looked her in the face, still as calm and cold as he was when he walked out of Fredericks’ Manor.

 

“You’re angry with me,” he said.

 

“You’re damn right I’m angry,” her voice sounded too loud, even to her own ears. “I told you to stay with me.”

 

“I did what needed to be done.” The words were ominous as he loomed over her, still covered in congealing blood.

 

“What _you_ decided needed to be done. How are we supposed to get through this if you won’t _listen_ to me?” She was a cop, for God’s sake. She understood tactical decisions and he would have listened to her if not for his nobleman’s pride.

 

“I don’t expect you’d understand,” Crane said harshly, stepping closer to her. The iron tang of the blood filled her nostrils, made the bile rise in her throat, and she almost stepped back from him in disgust.

 

Abbie’s retort was already in her mouth when she looked up into his face and saw—

 

She stopped, lips still parted in anger, and looked at him.

 

She saw death there. There was death in Ichabod’s eyes: not the demon’s death but his own. Abbie’s skin prickled as she remembered that the man standing in front of her was dead—had been dead for two-hundred years—and now he lived again. The truth of his undeath lingered in his eyes, alongside the haunting half-death of his wife and, now, the understanding that his unknown son was also long dead and lost forever. The air was suddenly thick in her lungs. Abbie had seen many people die, but they had had the privilege to die all at once, not in fits and starts like this. This... this was _wrong_ , and the wrongness of it threatened to strangle them both. So, she clicked her teeth down around her anger, inhaled slowly through her nose, and touched her bloodied hand to Ichabod’s arm again.

 

He gentled slightly, his mouth twitched down at the corners. Abbie didn’t apologize, she wasn’t sorry for what she said, but she did squeeze his bicep softly and said, “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

 

Crane seemed to realize then that he was filthy and looked down at himself with disgust, nostrils flaring. “Quite.”  Abbie almost laughed at that, and the quirk of her lips seemed to chase some of the haunted look from his eyes.

 

“All right,” she said inadequately, squeezing his arm again, and nudged him to the bathroom. He went easily and she followed close behind, saying, “I’ll grab you something else to wear, leave those clothes on the floor when you’re out of them.” Abbie went into his bedroom then and, using her clean hand, rummaged through his dresser until she found the flannel pajamas she had bought for him when he first arrived and which he’d probably never worn.

 

Crane was already gingerly sliding his shirt off his shoulders when she appeared in the doorway to the bathroom. If Abbie looked at him longer than was strictly necessary, she didn’t let herself acknowledge it and Ichabod didn’t notice. “Here,” she said, holding the flannel out to him. When he reached to take it she reconsidered and pulled it back from his bloodied grasp. “Actually,” she said and, by way of explanation, dropped the clothes on top of the closed toilet.

 

“Ah, of course,” he murmured, and looked down at his own hands, a wry smile twisting his lips.

 

“When you’re done,” Abbie said finally, “I’ll look at those cuts for you.” She indicated the sluggishly-bleeding wounds on his chest and arm.

 

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” He sounded exhausted, so she turned from the doorway and went to wash her own hands in the kitchen sink. Abbie heard the shower running soon after and busied herself by stoking the banked coals in Crane’s fireplace, coaxing a cheery blaze into existence, and by readying the first aid kit Corbin had kept over the sink. It needed restocking, but would get Crane through tonight.

 

Abbie sat and watched the fire crackle and listened to the shower run. She chafed her hands together, feeling chilled despite the warmth filling the little cabin. She rubbed her eyes hard with her fingertips, trying to forget the way Crane had looked when he had told her not to follow him, when he had loomed in the cabin’s doorway, coated in blood. Sometimes, he was like a little boy, equally lost in and delighted by the world he had woken up in. Other times, he was so stiff and proper and disdainful it made her laugh. But the Crane she had seen tonight was neither of those men. It was a man she didn’t know.

 

“ _I am in control!”_

Abbie physically startled at the intrusion of that memory. Crane’s voice rang in her skull the way it had rung through the tunnels that day they had trapped the Horseman. She stilled. At the time, she had thought his recklessness was a fluke. She wanted to believe that it was only the bizarre situation that had pushed Crane to such extremes; that had pushed him to disregard her advice and her help. But it was a part of him, too. Abbie knew he was arrogant, but he was also rash. She pressed her knuckles to her mouth.

 

Crane’s actions could—had—put them both in danger. She needed to make sure he would listen to her in the future. She needed to make him _see_.

 

“Abbie?” Ichabod’s voice came quietly from behind her.

 

Abbie was proud that she kept herself from jumping. She turned to see that he was clean and mostly dry, just his hair was still hanging damp around his shoulders, and that he was still shirtless, his wounds exposed.

 

“Come sit,” she said, patting the cushion beside her. He stepped around the couch and sat stiffly beside her. She worked quietly and quickly, smearing antibiotic ointment into the cuts, covering them with carefully sized gauze and tape. He wouldn’t need stiches, but she applied a few butterfly bandages to the worst wounds to hold them closed before covering them like the others. Crane sat silently as she tended him and when she glanced up at his face, she saw he was staring into the fire. He didn’t even notice when she carefully traced the two-hundred-year-old scar that crossed his chest before adhering the last piece of medical tape.

 

When Abbie was finished, her fingers had blood on them again, but she wiped them clean on the last piece of gauze and tossed it into the fireplace. The sudden bloom of flame drew Crane’s attention back to her and he turned to meet her gaze.

 

“Thank you, Lieutenant.”

 

“Been saying that a lot, tonight”

 

“Well,” he paused, controlled, “I mean it.”

 

Abbie sighed. She rubbed the corners of her eyes and said, “We need to talk.”

 

“Do we?” he asked softly.

 

And then, damn him, Ichabod looked like that little boy again: lost and sad and alone in this world far from anything he knew. Far from his family. _I should like to go home_ , he had said. But Abbie couldn’t take him home, not really. He’d never go home again. Abbie pressed her lips together. She couldn’t do it. Not now. The cop in her wanted to have it out, to detail his faults and the way he hurt their partnership, but—

 

“No…” she recanted, smiling sadly at him, “not right now.”

 

Ichabod was still looking at her, waiting, but he was trembling.  She saw it in his hands, his long, elegant fingers were quavering. He didn’t seem to notice.  Abbie placed one of her small hands over his shaking fingers. “Are you okay?”

 

Ichabod blinked at her before surprising her with the truth.

 

“No,” he rasped, broken.

 

“Crane,” Abbie said, tightening her hand on his.

 

“My son…”

 

“Ichabod.” She moved her other hand to his cheek.

 

“I…” he began.

 

“Shh,” she hushed him and pulled him forward into her arms. Ichabod folded bonelessly into her embrace and, after a moment, turned his face into the side of her neck. Abbie held him carefully, but he didn’t pull away. They stayed there, breathing together, for a long moment. Then, his shaking intensified and she almost pushed him back from her in a panic, thinking he was going into shock, before she realized that Ichabod was weeping. He didn’t make a sound, but she could feel the tears on her skin and he was holding his breath the same way she would when she was a child, when she didn’t want Jenny to hear her crying at night.

 

Abbie lifted a hand to the back of Ichabod’s head, stroked it carefully over his damp hair. He did sob then, once, quietly, and it was quickly stifled. “It’s okay,” she murmured, even though it wasn’t, “it’s okay.” He made a desperate, strangled noise into her skin and she tangled her hand in his hair to cradle the back of his head. “Breathe,” she told him and he obeyed, taking a deep, shuddering breath before exhaling it in a rush against her collarbone. She rubbed her other hand slowly between his shoulder-blades, trying to get him to relax. He was still shaking, still holding his breath. “Breathe,” she said again, firmly, and he took another shuddering gulp of air. “That’s good,” she soothed, “keep breathing.” He took another deep breath, then another, and another, and seemed to settle in her arms. He stayed there, breath puffing gently across her skin, composing himself. After a moment, the muscles across his back stiffened and she knew it was over. He pulled away from her slowly and lifted a hand quickly to his face, hiding his eyes from her.

 

“My apologies, Lieutenant,” he said coolly, scrambling to appear as a proper nobleman once more.

 

“Crane—Ichabod,” she corrected herself and grasped his wrist, gently pulling his hand from his face. He didn’t look at her, even then.

 

“Ichabod,” she repeated, feeling fierce, “you have been through more shit than any man should ever have to go through. So _do not_ apologize to me.”

 

Ichabod met her eyes, then, looking up at her through his eyelashes, face still turned down in shame. He dropped his gaze and smirked wryly.

 

“It seems I shall never repay my debts to you, Miss Mills,” he paused. “Abbie.”

 

“Well,” she said, thinking of seven long years ahead, “we’ll have plenty of time together for you to work on it.” His smirk nearly turned into a real smile, and she counted that one a win.

 

Ichabod sniffled then, managing to sound both petulant and cute, so Abbie patted his hand gently and stood. “I’ll get you some tissues,” she told him, “and your shirt.”

 

He seemed to remember, then, that he was only half-dressed and made a flustered effort to appear nonchalant about the realization. “Yes, of course.”

 

She almost laughed.

 

Back in the bathroom, she remembered his bloody clothes when they tangled in her feet, so she quickly plugged the tub and began filling it with cold water. While the tub filled, she wiped down the tile that had been smeared with blood.  She gathered up Crane’s shirt and trousers and dumped them in the water to soak and turned off the tap.  Washing the blood off her hands for what she hoped was the last time that evening, she grabbed Crane’s flannel shirt and a box of tissues and went back to the fireplace.

 

Crane looked more himself when she returned. His face was calm and he had finger-combed his nearly-dry hair back from his face. He accepted the box of tissues from her graciously but didn’t use any of them, setting it gently aside. Instead, he stood and slipped his shirt on, gingerly easing it over his fresh bandages.

 

“I must commend you, Miss Mills, you’ve done a fine job tending my wounds,” he told her, looking at the gauze before glancing at her with one elegantly raised eyebrow. She smirked at him.

 

“Anytime,” she said, feeling almost normal again.

 

Crane hugged her again; an almost-normal hug, with her cheek against his chest and his chin on top of her head. “Thank you,” he said again, so quietly she almost didn’t hear, and she felt something deep and frightening flutter in her chest. Abbie closed her eyes tight against it so when he pulled out of the hug she had pushed it away where he couldn’t see. She smiled tightly at him and he returned the gesture, still awkward in their openness with each other.

 

When Crane offered to make tea to “calm the nerves” Abbie accepted and sat quietly on the couch while he puttered in the kitchen. They should really talk about what happened, his recklessness, and her fear, but it seemed cruel now. She wasn’t sure how much one man could take in a given night.

 

Instead, Abbie accepted the warm mug he offered her and they sat in front of the fire and chatted amiably and comfortably about nothing important. Crane looked so grateful and so relieved for her quiet companionship, that she put the issue from her mind, promising herself that they’d talk about it tomorrow.

 

Eventually, he went to bed (at her stubborn urging) and she crashed on his couch. Nothing was fixed when the morning inevitably came but Crane seemed less desperate when he awoke, if still wounded, and that was good enough for her.

 

For today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

______________________________________________________________________________

AN: Someone really needs to make an Ichabbie vid with “Barton Hollow” so, you know, get on that you talented people.


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